May 2008

Chair Butt

This week in the Dilbert comic, Alice discovers she has a bad case of chair butt. United Media, the company that syndicates Dilbert, rejected the first version I submitted. It looked like this:

My editors thought the pose looked too provocative. They requested I redraw Alice in less of a “mount me” position. I argued that in the context of a medical exam, no one would interpret her pose as sexual. This argument did not carry the day. So I went back to the drawing board with the instructions to make it look “more medical.”

At this point in the story I should pause to confess I did not attend medical school. I don’t know exactly how a trained physician would examine a patient for signs of chair butt. So I took an educated guess and resubmitted the comic. Here’s a peek.

Although my editors have no formal medical training, they were nonetheless certain my depiction of a chair butt exam was inaccurate. I went back to the drawing board a third time and drew the version that was accepted and ran in newspapers. Here it is.

What I learned from this experience is that being a doctor takes more than common sense and a willingness to look at unattractive naked people. I don’t know how much more it takes, but I intend to keep drawing comics until I find out.

Comments

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Very interesting stuff... and as for the comment about a "Dilbert Uncut" book, I'm all for it. I've been saving every "uncensored" Dilbert comic since... *checks archive* ...well actually I just have a whole bunch from 1992 to the present, including some from 1997, 1999 and 2000.

I'm sure there's been MANY, MANY more that I don't know about, and I would absolutely LOVE to see a "Dilbert Uncut" - fully uncensored, featuring all of your comments and alternate versions (kind of like you've been doing in the blog!)

I enjoy seeing older alternate and uncensored versions. And I'm glad they are finally surfacing - it makes the mystique of Dilbert all the more exciting!

Does your editing company know the last image is really the most provocative? That's the only one in which he looks actually able to get his cock in her. I wouldn't want to try the first one; you'd have to be on the table too and with her that close to the edge you'd probably fall on your ass. But standing on the ground, leaning forward... yeah, that's probably just about right.

Scott, it's simple. Make two copies of every strip...the first one with every character placement as suggestive and evocative as possible...the second copy is your "proper" strip. Submit the first one first, and they'll happily take the second without question.

I dont think thats offensive at all.
Not too many people read the comics nowadays
beause syndicates are not accepting new characters anymore
Isn't this hurting the industry?
I guess they'd rather reprint old ones to be safe.

A prime example of American syndicated comic having very little to do with humor is Dennis the Menace. The original Scottish strip had Dennis being a manace. He'd practically set mr. Wilson on fire to watch him die. He even looks like he's just been released from a juvenile detention facility. Dennis the Menace here isn't menacing. he's cute and adorable, and makes for an unappealing character.

It's no wonder they don't like chair butt. I wonder if you've ever been asked to make sure your characters aren't anatomically correct underneath the clothes they wear in your drawings.

And this is what's wrong with print comics today. Also, why I haven't read anything in print in years. I'm a much bigger fan of Overcompensating, or Penny Arcade than anything in print. Even Desiel Sweeties has a very hard time producing print comics that are up to the standard of the web-released versions.

I'm reading some of these comments here and it seems to me your fans are mostly idiots. I wonder if they even understand the content in your stips or if they simply smile at the pictures and think to themselves "That dog is wearing glasses."